There comes a time in everyone’s life when you realize you are not – and will never be – Stanley Tucci.
It might be when you look around and discover you’re not traveling around Italy with a film crew in pursuit of the rare and tasty consummate Italian dishes.
Or it might be when you’re shocked to realize you don’t spend holidays with John Krasinski and Emily Blunt – not that I assume Stanley Tucci does all the time, but when it NEVER happens, that’s a pretty big clue that you are not Stanley Tucci.
But more often than not, it’s when you realize you don’t need to be Stanley Tucci to make a Negroni. At least not when the Emmys are on.
I mean, being Stanley Tucci helps, sure. That’s just true for any walk in life. The suave cocktail couture; the glasses that fit neatly and don’t go flying off the head randomly; the I’m-Stanley-Tucci-and-I-know-it voice while teaching the art of the Negroni.
But here’s how you prepare a Negroni without being Stanley Tucci:
Ingredients Needed:
- The 2021 Emmys Red Carpet special.
- Ideally, acceptance of yourself as a balding 40+ white male. Recognition of your whims and quirks. You might not BE Tucci, but you can have aspirations to Tuccidom.
- A shirt you could theoretically tuck in. After losing a few pounds. Or stones.
- Gin.
- Campari.
- Vermouth.
- And heaven help you if you use dry vermouth.
- An orange.
Preparation:
- Deploy the fancy crackers and cheese dip.
- Take a photo of your bottles, glasses, and shaker, artfully off-center to show people how soulful you are.
- Muddle and publish subtle left-wing propaganda promoting vaccines so MAGA die-hards literally do die hard to own you by not taking life-saving vaccines. Because you’re sneaky that way.
- Drink a glass of bourbon. It won’t make you Stanley Tucci, but this is just always good advice (except when it isn’t).
- Grab a shaker, fill it with ice. Bonus points if the shaker is a fashionable color, like rose-gold.
- Add two shots of gin, one shot of campari, one shot of vermouth. Pop that lid back in the gin bottle. Cap that s**t. You’re not asking, “Am I done with this? I’m not sure?” No. You’re done with that noise.
- If a show you’ve never seen wins an award you wanted for your favorite show, even if a majority of voters seem happy with it, demand a recall no matter what it costs the California voter. Because there are principles, darn it.
- Slice an orange. Smash it with the knife.
- Throw away the first orange, because your artful wedges look more a shredded-half-frisbee after a Doberman finished with it.
Seriously, a Breitbart ‘journalist’ who is himself vaccinated claimed the left, by mandating the vaccine, is trying to kill off the right by tricking the right into not taking the vaccine. Someone was paid by Breitbart to write that. I’m not linking only to avoid giving him clicks, because he’s writing shit to profit over the politicization of a vaccine. Think about that. This is why we need Negronis to get through the news-cycle.
- Drink another glass of bourbon and keep watching the glory that is Billy Porter on the red carpet.
- Seriously, get the vaccine. You can’t own the libs if you’re dead.
- Slice the orange more carefully this time, trimming the ends, cutting the remainder in half, then slicing neat half-arcs to garnish your coupe glasses.
- Shake the shaker like you mean it.
- Smirk like everyone’s watching.
- Then be glad no one’s watching because you’re in sloppy fitting jeans with a hole in the knee and a faded Star Wars t-shirt, also known as your work uniform after a bazillion year pandemic.
- Take a photo that you like so much that you use it as an excuse for an entire concept blog post just because.
- For the coup de grâce, serve it in a coupe glass. We might be in a pandemic, but we’re not heathens. Need one? Check here.
Modifications:
A Negroni, done right, can taste a bit oily or syrupy. One option to fix? Add a bit of ice and La Croix sparkling water to mellow the taste.
Writing At 1 AM 